Simply Put, Hawks Make Game Look Difficult

November 12, 1998|By Michael Rosenberg, Tribune Staff Writer.

After three weeks of losing, the Blackhawks finally have figured out what's wrong.

Everything.

It's not just the power play and it's not just the penalty killing, although both have been inconsistent. It's not just the mistakes on defense and it's not just the foolish passes, although both have been plentiful. And it's not just that the Hawks are pressing, although they evidently are.

The Hawks have put all those forth as reasons for their current 0-6-1 streak, but none of them can explain the team's performance Tuesday night. The Hawks were outscored 5-2, outshot 41-14 and all-out embarrassed in St. Louis, prompting coach Dirk Graham to call it a "disgrace."

The Hawks are falling so quickly toward the NHL's basement they are threatening to dent the floor. Only the San Jose Sharks (2-7-4) have a worse record than the Hawks (4-8-2), and if they don't beat Toronto Thursday they will have gone winless in eight straight games. Last year's team--which missed the playoffs--never did that.

But there is good news. The Hawks finally have figured out what they can do to snap out of this nightmare.

Nothing.

"We can dissect this all day," center Doug Gilmour said. "The more you dissect it, the harder the game gets. The game is pretty simple."

To Graham, the game is simply a matter of playing hard, sticking to the system and sticking up for your teammates.

After the St. Louis debacle, Graham said only two players on his team brought anything to the table: Dennis Bonvie and Reid Simpson.

Incidentally, there were two fights in the first three minutes. The Hawks' participants? Bonvie and Simpson.

Bonvie and Simpson have combined to play 11 games, and neither has scored a point. That's fine; they aren't on the ice to score. But if Bonvie and Simpson are the ideal, then the players who are supposed to score shouldn't try to play that same physical game. That doesn't work.

"Maybe some of them . . . we don't want to see Dan Cleary try to run people through the boards," General Manager Bob Murray said. "Some of them may be a little bit too overboard. That may have been overemphasized by everybody, how we wanted to get back to physical play."

Yet it still is being emphasized, and Graham sooner would wear a Red Wings jersey than loosen his grip on the team. Always one of the hardest workers in the league during his playing days, Graham says the only solution for his team is to keep working. He says, unequivocally, that he won't pull back.

"That's an easy way out," he said. "And there is no easy way to win. There are no shortcuts. When you start taking shortcuts, you rely on shortcuts."

At least they would be relying on something. Tuesday night, the team's No. 1 goalie and top goal-scorer picked up 14 minutes of penalties that they later admitted were simply borne out of frustration. Jeff Hackett left the net to go after Jim Campbell, getting roughing and holding penalties, and Tony Amonte was penalized for complaining to the referee.

"If you're not wearing the `A' on your sweater, you shouldn't be talking to the ref," Amonte said. "Out of frustration and stupidity and selfishness, I got a 10-minute misconduct."

Amonte, among the league leaders in goals with nine, doesn't wear the "A" on the road. Ethan Moreau takes his place as alternate captain, one of several ways in which the Hawks are trying to mold Moreau into the top-line winger they think he can be. They consider him a cornerstone for the future, along with Chad Kilger, Eric Daze and Cleary.

And Alex Zhamnov. But at 28 years old and $3 million per season, Zhamnov is supposed to produce now, not later. He can be great on the power play, but his even-strength play comes and goes.

"With the exception of a couple of games, I think Alex has played a lot harder than he has the last couple of years," Murray said. "I don't think people have finished for him around the net, but Alex is going to have to finish some for himself. He is going to have to score."

Zhamnov only has one goal.

"I do think he's competing hard enough now," Murray said. "At some points the last couple of years, you wondered."

His team also has one goal: to get out of this slump, somehow, some way, before it swallows its season. The Hawks are winless in seven straight with Curtis Joseph and Dominik Hasek on the horizon.

Even though Joseph has struggled a bit in his move to Toronto, now is not the best time to be playing must-win games, or to be learning the system. But that's what the Hawks are doing.

"In this system, everybody has to play the same way," Amonte said.

In that sense, they have succeeded in an unintended manner. The Hawks all are playing the same way.